Emily Santamaria
Emily Santamaria is one of the main characters who became a mermaid in the Australian television series, Next Generation Mermaids. Along with Sarah Powers and Amber Nelson, Emma discovered her powers after her trip to Mako Island. Emily left the main cast after Season 2. She was portrayed by actress Claire Holt. Biography When Emily was only six-months-old, she had been introduced into the world of swimming by her father, Neil Santamaria. Since then, Emily dedicated most of her free time training and competing for her swim team, and had won countless trophies for it. Unfortunately, due to protecting her mermaid secret, she had to quit the team. Out of all three girls, Emily grew up in a more stable environment as her father is a business man in sales and financial development. Her mother, Lisa Santamaria, was once a junior lifeguard and currently collects crystal figurines. Because her father’s job allows him to affiliate with Harrison Cameron's business and investments, Emily and her brother, Elliot Santamaria, grew up along-side with Jordan, Harrison’s son, since she was three years old. Despite their childhood companionship, Emily and Jordan grew weary of each other as they grew older. Because their parents are still close friends, the two of them continued to be friendly towards the other on some occasions. Despite growing up in a more wealthier lifestyle than her friends, Emily lacks the personality of a snob. Unlike her popular classmate, Miriam Kent, Emily and her brother were taught to be respectful and truthful to one another. Used to her perfect family lifestyle, Emily admits feeling guilty whenever she had to lie to her brother or her parents. Unlike her friend, Sarah Powers who does not get along with her younger sibling, Emily shares a close relationship with her younger sibling, Elliot, and at often times she would try to comfort and reassure him whenever he’s unhappy. Although several times, they still got on each other nerves and argue. Sometime during her childhood, Emily met Sarah and the two of them became close friends ever since to the point where Emily is aware of Sarah's bad singing. Because of her yearly intense training for her competitive swimming team, Emily had only attended Sarah’s first few childhood birthday parties, last being her sixth. After years of friendship, she wasn’t aware that Sarah’s birthday parties had remained the same childish party, courtesy of Sarah's father. Moon Spell In the episode "Moon Spell", Emily decided to take on the full task of throwing her father a surprise birthday party. During the festivity, Emily became the first of the three girls to fall under the effects of the full moon when she saw its reflection in a bowl of fruit punch. The magic of the full moon turned her into the exact opposite of herself; a wild, and carefree mermaid. In this state, she freely expresses her true opinions on people, regardless of whether it would offend them or not. While under the effect of the full moon, Emily feels inexplicably drawn to water and to Mako Island. It also caused her to transform into a mermaid when she dove into the canal but prevent her reverse-transformation, despite Amber’s attempt to dry her off completely. The moon spell also caused Emily to develop a craving for sea food, including raw fish, the usual diet of a full-blown mermaid. The spell also caused her to express her true feelings towards Byron when she attempts to seduce and kiss him twice. Emily didn’t turn back into a human until the full moon completely set the next morning, leaving her with no memory of the previous evening events. JuiceNet Café The the episode "The Big Chill" Emily began working at the Juice Net Cafe. With her obsession for organization, perfection, and order, Emily changed the café business by alphabetizing the fruit, color-coding the juice bubbles, and timing the customers’ orders. She would usually arrive at work long before the other employees and was mentioned to have stayed behind later after closing time. At one point, Emily would pull some strings for her friends by asking Wilfred to let her use the café for the school dance. In season two, Emily is keened on getting the job as the café’s new supervisor and advised Wilfred to hire one. Unfortunately, he hired Daniel instead, which only made her feel more bitter towards him at first, but later warms up to him. Being the best and most hardworking employee there, Emily won the “Employee of the Month” award. Fish Fever Despite not being under the influence of the full moon, Emily once again developed a craving for raw fish and seafood in the episode "Fish Fever". While helping with the search for a coral for Sarah's new fish tank, Emily accidentally cut herself on a strange, rainbow-colored coral. Unknown to the girls, the toxic coral can affect a mermaid tremendously. At first, it caused her to be overexcited, but the more the poison seeps into Emily's system, the more ravenous she gets. The poison also caused tremendous mutation in a mermaid's physical system. For Emily, her usual copper-golden-orange scales slowly turned white and scales even appeared on the skin, her hands turned more webbed, her fingernails into claws, her skin more monstrous, her neck sprouted a set of gills, her hair started to go green, her eyes turned yellow and she made monster-like noises. She was later totally cured when Ryan sprayed an antidote on her skin, developed by Laurie. After the Events of Season Three In the spin off series, Mermaids in the Sea, Emily is indirectly mentioned by Amber, who appears in the show. Amber reveals that Emily eventually moved from the Gold Coast after graduating high school. It is unknown what happened to her. Personality Emily has a confident and responsible, if somewhat controlling, personality. She tends to worry if things get out of control. She is very organized. Living in a perfect family lifestyle, she developed a need to be a perfectionist. She enjoys being the most organized of the girls and can’t help but encourage others to do the same. As well as being a driven individual, Emily once dedicated her free time in training for her regional swimming competition. Although she resigned after turning into a mermaid because it precludes her from swimming, Emily retains a bit of her driven personality. She does seem to be more empathic than her friend, Amber Nelson when it comes to understanding other people’s feelings and daily problems. She tends to express many concerns for her friends and would even go out of her way to try and do the impossible for them, even trying her best to restore Emma Gilbert’s decaying boat. Although Emily is often the most conscientious and considerate of the three girls, at times she can be pedantic and controlling, once even suggesting that she considers chewing a prescribed number of times before swallowing as a normal practice. Emily also displays a responsible trait where she tends to wake up early for work before café opens and stays late after closing as we found out in the episode "Get Off My Tail". Being the responsible one, she constantly reminds her brother and friends to do their work and is often paranoid when things aren’t organized. This tends to drive those around her insane at times when she stressed about it too often. Often times, she doesn’t listen to what other people say and assumes the situation for the worse. When push comes to shove, she would often show-off and proves to others that she can be more or just as skilled as they are in certain events. In "Riding For a Fall", she attempts to show off her newfound knowledge about riding horses to Daniel, but her plan only backfired. In "Fire and Ice", she attempts to become a rebellious girl, just like Amber, to show that she can be fun to be around. She fails to do this when she decides to have a party while her parents are away. Once the party gets out of hand with the help of Amber she gets it to stop and admits this isn't the way for her. But in the same episode she shows true honesty when she confesses about the party to her parents who assumed Amber had thrown while they were away for the weekend. Her ideas for organization and control sometimes brings her into conflict with Amber, who is Emily's polar opposite. Often times, Emily would disagree and argue with Amber, who is her polar opposite. While in contrast to Amber’s rebellious and care-free personality, Emily is controlling and organized. Because of their opposite personalities and different ideals, Emily and Amber often argue and have various conflicts, leaving Sarah stuck in the middle of their fight. Aside from her girly personality, Emily is shy and emotional. Also, another trait for Emily is bossy. While arguing with Amber, she bosses her around but no knowing that it sometimes hurts her feelings. Emily is not as tough and thick-skinned as she puts on; in her own words, "I may seem tough, but I'm easily hurt." ("Sink or Swim ") Appearance Emily is a very pretty teenage girl, and has golden hair and blue eyes. Her hair is extremely long, reaching along her waist. Her skin is quite fair and smooth. In Season One, she usually lets her hair down, but as the series progresses, she begins to tie it up like Amber and Sarah. As a mermaid, her hair is let down and she has an orange-scaled tail with a matching top. In episode "Red Herring" , Emily decided to change her hair color, but Sarah accidentally dyes it completely red. Since her hair's color changed when she was a mermaid, her normal hair returns when she is in her human form. In the end, she decides to change it back to her old color. In season 1 and the beginning of season 2, Emily wears a colorful Hawaiian-styled shirt as her JuiceNet Café uniform with a small white apron over her trousers. When Daniel became the café's new supervisor, she wore a blue and red polo shirt with a small embroider picture of a pineapple with a matching hat. Emily later convinced Daniel to let them ditch the hat, but they kept the top. Her casual clothes have a lot of blue and white tank tops, based on her powers on turning water to ice. So this basically means her favorite colors are blue and white. She also wears a locket identical to Amber and Sarah's, only with a white stone, to represent the water's freezing ability. Becoming a Mermaid One day, Sarah was helping Emily train for her regional swimming competition by timing her. While Sarah later left for home, Emily continued to train some more. Later on during her walk home, Emily ran into Sarah again but this time she was riding in Jordan’s zodiac boat with the new girl, Amber. Sarah and Amber invited her for a ride with Amber suggesting that they go out into the ocean for some fun and Emily expressing her concern. With the carefree Amber steering the boat out into the sea and miles offshore, the girls soon found out that they are now out of fuel in the middle of the ocean. With little choice, the three girls paddled their way to the closest land they could find: Mako Island. Once ashore the deserted island, Emily and her friends pondered on how they should call for help. Being the most prepared one in the group, Emily brought out her cell phone but only to find that it couldn’t get a signal. Emily suggested that they should head inland towards a higher altitude in hopes of getting a signal for a call. As they ventured in deeper into the jungle-infested island, the three girls soon came across a clearing where a river stream turns into a waterfall over several boulders. While Emily and Amber were able to jump over to the small waterfall, Sarah became hesitant and without a warning, fell into a hole. The other two followed her and continued to pursue a way out of the underground cave. Several hours later, the three of them ended up at the end of the tunnel and found the moon cave with a pool at the bottom of the island’s dormant volcano. Emily realizes that the Moon Pool is connected to the ocean and may be their only way out, dove in to find out. Confirming her find, she and Amber convinced the hesitant Sarah to escape with them. When all three of them entered the pool, the full moon became aligned with the moon pool, causing it to bubble and glow a mystic blue glow and emitting small orbs of magical light particles into the air. Oblivious to what was happening to them, the girls ventured out into open sea where they were rescued by the local water-police. Around twelve hours later, Emily went to the ocean for a morning swim. After ten seconds in the ocean water, Emily was shocked to feel that she no long has human legs but instead, she sprouted a mermaid tail. She later confirms that she wasn’t the only one who became a mermaid as the same thing had happened to Sarah and Amber. Mermaid Powers Emily possesses the ability to transform into a mermaid ten seconds after physical contact of water. She turns back into a human several minutes after climbing out of the the water and once her body is completely dry, she turns back into a human along with the clothes she was wearing before she transformed. As a mermaid, Emily has the ability to swim at super speed of 600km/h, hold their breath for more than fifteen minutes, and dive at a depth lower than any ordinary human being. Hydro-Cryokinesis Emily is the second mermaid to discover her individual powers over water: the ability to freeze water. Her ability can cause things to become brittle enough for her to break, such as an electronic lock. She can freeze an entire person and put them into stasis lock or render them immobile by freezing only their wet suits. With Sarah’s power, Emily can create ice sculptures or ice-orbs, but it would eventually melt or shatter. At first, it implies that she could only freeze things with water over it. But several times in season one, Emily was able to freeze, cool, and lock objects with her powers without the aids of water. This could imply that she can freeze the small water molecules around those dry objects. With this power, Emily can freeze water and all other liquids to freezing temperatures literally to absolute zero. Cryokinesis In the second season premiere "Stormy Weather", a special full moon along with a rare planetary alignment greatly strengthens and increases her powers to much more powerful levels. Emily’s new mermaid power is Cryokinesis, the power to create, generate, manipulate and control ice, snow, sleet and hail at will. It allows her to freeze any object without water, even freezing an entire room. When in combination with Sarah and Amber's advanced powers, she can create unusually strong electric storms and levitate a person. It is shown that she can explode ice, too, in the episode when they were practicing their powers in the moon pool with the balloon penguin. This is a more advanced form of Hydro-Cryokinesis. Relationships Byron See the main article: Emily-Byron Relationship In season one she had a crush on Byron, a local surfing champion. At first, Emily denied having any feeling for him, despite a few obvious flirting actions such as flipping her hair when greeting him at the marine park. Emily claims that she and Byron are just friends, but after being struck by the power of the full moon, she starts to flirt and eventually seduced him during her father's birthday party. In a later episode, Byron asked her to be his swimming coach for the upcoming swimming tournament against Jordan. Due to the risk of getting wet, Emily at first declined, with Sarah and Amber supporting her judgment. Upon seeing how Jordan treated him, Emily changed her mind and decided to train Byron as his swimming coach. When they found out this news, Sarah and Amber accused Emily that the reason that she's training Byron was because she liked him. Emily denied this and insisted that she only wanted to help him win first place against Jordan. But while practicing they kissed. That resulted in Emily refusing to train him any longer. After having a fight, she unintentionally pushed Byron so that he would win first place. They decided to be friends again after that, and even danced at the school formal near the end of the season. However, their relationship seems to have ended off-screen as the actor didn't appeared in the second season. Daniel See the main article: Emily-Daniel Relationship In season two her love interest is Daniel, a horse riding instructor and the new supervisor of JuiceNet Cafe who she dates for the second half of season two. Emily has often been encouraged by her friends Amber and Sarah to reveal her mermaid secret to Daniel because he lacks the determination to find out her mermaid secret. At first, Emily despised Daniel and thought he was an arrogant person when she met him as the instructor to her younger brother Elliot. But when she accidentally poisoned his horse, Rebel, Emily felt terrible, and used her power to create snow in order to cure the horse. Surprised that she stayed with the sick horse overnight, Daniel expressed his thanks to her. Later on when Daniel was chosen to be the new supervisor of the Juice Net Cafe, Emily hated him more than she already did because she felt that he had stolen the job position that was meant for her. Failing to get the other employees to strike against him, Emily felt more hatred for Daniel. Emily witnessed helpless as she watched Daniel introduced new schedules for the staff, new uniforms (which included a silly hat), took her own hard-worked juice recipe off of the menu, changed the ice-room storing system, and even created basketball games for the customers. When Emily saw how much fun everyone was having, she decided to swallow her pride and work with him instead of against him, only to be shocked to find out that Daniel had fired her because he thought she broke the new storing system. Later, Daniel discovered that she was innocent and it was Amber who didn't follow his new orders because too many changes came too fast. Daniel appeared at her front door steps, begging her to come back, which she didn't want to at first. He offered to slow down his ideas of changes for the restaurant, admitted that she was right, and offered to put back her home-made juice recipe on the menu to which then, did she agreed to return to work there. Later on, they went on a few several dates. At one point, Daniel almost forced Emily into the water because he believed that she's aqua-phobic and that he wanted to help her get over her fears. Luckily, she convinced him to stop just in time, but was in danger of having her secrets revealed again near the end of the second season. As the pressure of her secrets pressed on her relationship with Daniel, he demanded to know what she was hiding, but she refused despite having Charlotte using her magical powers against her, almost revealing her secret in front of him. At the end of season two, Emily decided to reveal to Daniel that she is a mermaid. Daniel was ok with it and they continued their relationship. Absence Emily was absent for one episode, "The Cleo Code, Part One". Instead, she only appeared in a flashback where she found Cleo's locket at the bottom of the Moon Pool. The reason remains unknown. For season three, Emily is completely absent from the show because Claire Holt was busy filming The Messengers 2: The Scarecrow. To explain her absence, the producers decided to let Amber and Sarah mention that Emily is traveling the world with her family. Her pictures can still be seen in Sarah's room, however. See also *Emily (MA) Trivia *Emily is the only one of the mermaids (except possibly Taylor) whose parents are still together. *Emily has never met Taylor. *Her favorite food is Lobster Thermidor, as said by her mother in "Fish Fever", this is also her father's favorite food. *Before becoming a mermaid, Emily was a professional swimmer. *Emily was the first one to turn into mermaid in the series. *She is the only one of the mermaids who has never been seen singing. *Emily gave her locket to Sarah before she left for her trip. *Emily was the first to be affected by the Full Moon. *Emily likes dolphins. *Emily is richer than Sarah and Amber, and in the same social class of Miriam and Jordan. *Emily is very sensitive. *Just like her friend Sarah, Emily is very good at science. *Emily was the first one in the Moon Pool. *Emily was the second one to discover her power over water, called Hydro-Cryokinesis. *Emily was the first one to discover she's a mermaid. *Emily did not appear in Season 3. *Emily was the first character to speak in the series. *Emily was the only mermaid to have two boyfriends. *She is the only one of the mermaids who never had an antagonist get between her and her boyfriends.